Wednesday, February 26, 2014

The journey men: Gruff Rhys/Telegram/FTSE

Gruff Rhys - American Interior

American Interior is a travelogue about John Evans, a young farmhand from Snowdonia who travelled across 18th century America. There'll be a book, documentary film (out the same week as the record - here's the trailer) and app, but primarily for our purposes there's an album out May 5th, the title track of which plays with theme-appropriate ideas of being carried across new worlds and visions while sounding like a wistful, swept across the plains, acid guitar soloing Van Dyke Parks on a budget. Good to have his particular sense of wanderlust back amongst us.

Telegram - Rule Number One

Follow was one of the most exciting debut singles of 2013; for a follow-up the hair-tossing Kraut-glam-psychists continue the bloodied charge to who knows where. That is to say there's wah and distortion pedal abuse, oohing backing vocals, reminders of Eno at his most charged and sounding much like it's falling down an endless technicolour wormhole.

FTSE - Nite Lite

FTSE is Sam Manville, who used to be in post-hardcore oddballs Blakfish* and then thematic garage duo Hymns, and now sounds nothing like either. As FTSE he's developing a reputation for scuffed up bass-heavy production, here melding foreboding early hours beats with artfully crossthreaded vocals from himself and one Femme. The LOVE UN LTD EP is out April 21st.

(* who we once saw supported by Colour, who featured the future second half of AlunaGeorge, whose re-emergence brought out the surprising past favouritism of Discloure. With members of Tubelord and Meet Me In St Louis kicking around in new guises of late as well, clearly the new hotbed of young talent has shifted from the Brit School to Big Scary Monsters' back catalogue. If the next hot anonymous bedroom producer turns out to be a former member of Cats And Cats And Cats we'll become highly suspicious.)